New Ideas for Your Calendar Time

You’re probably always looking for new ideas for your calendar time, because primary grade teachers know that classroom calendar time has amazing potential for integrated and multi-level math learning!

Most teachers are already using the calendar for lots of math teaching and more, like…

• Counting
• Days of the week and months of the year
• Place value, as you move up toward the all-important Math Holiday, the 100th Day of School 🙂
• Sequence of numbers (before, after, between)

But it’s far too easy for these daily repetitive routines to become … well, boring, both for our students and for us.  And, of course, when that happens, it’s all downhill.  So, let’s look at two new ideas for your calendar time that are sure to bring back interest and excitement for you AND your kiddos every day!

Here’s a super simple way to add some excitement AND learning! We called it “Pick a Stick”! 

Each day at the end of our calendar time, the Top Banana (our fun and silly name for our helper of the day) got to pick a craft stick from a jar. The sticks were labeled with calendar activities, like “Say the names of the days of the week”,  “Name the number that’s ten more than today’s date”, or “Turn and tell a friend how many tens and how many ones are in today’s date”.  My students absolutely loved the excitement that picking a stick brought to our calendar time. After all, it was practically a game! 🙂

You could make your own sticks with the skills and activities that your own class needs some extra practice with. Or you could keep it even simpler for yourself with this freebie! Just roll a die and follow the directions. This page is not editable, but I’ve included a blank page in the file, so you can just write in your own ideas!

Click here to download Calendar Roll.

Here’s your second idea for keeping calendar time fresh!  If you follow my blog or TpT store, you already know that I’m a HUGE fan of riddles for learning.   These riddles combine knowledge of the months of the year with first grade math skills. 

Click here to download your calendar riddle set.

Each card has several clues that when solved lead to a date. The first clue will tell the month of the date.  The other clues will determine the number of the date.

The riddles are very versatile.   They’re not linked to any specific year and they don’t include any references to holidays or seasons.

If you’re using the cards as a whole class activity, here’s a way that you can build even more calendar knowledge!  Post a current yearly calendar.  When your students solve a riddle, have them find the date on the calendar and highlight it. So much integrated learning!!

The riddle cards come in black and white to save your colored ink, but as you see above, printing them on color paper gives them some extra pizzazz! 

I hope you’ll consider adding these new twists to your calendar time this year, and that you and your students will love learning with them!

Happy Learning!

Linda

Primary Inspiration